Andrew Sullivan’s Misguided Defense of the Regrettable Mr. Kushner

Andrew Sullivan has posted an attack on CUNY trustee Jeffrey Wiesenfeld for blocking a politically motivated honorary degree that was to be given to the over-rated, crypto-communist and Israel-demonizing playwright Tony Kushner. Andrew’s intelligence is on display in the opening paragraph of his piece where he reiterates his clear-headed views of Kushner’s inflated literary reputation. Kushner’s Pulitzer-winning agitprop, Angels in America, is a puerile embarrassment and in recognizing this Andrew shows that he is capable of breaking out of the bubble of liberal derangement when it suits him. All the more reason that Andrew’s attack on Wiesenfeld is an instructive illustration of the unhinged attitudes of current “critics” of Israel, who are apologists for Hamas and their Gaza supporters.

The Palestinian case against Israel, as we noted in our ad in the New York Times is built on genocidal lies — lies which Andrew seems to have swallowed whole. Andrew wonders how apologists for Jew-hating Arab aggressors in the Middle East can be regarded as anything but reasonable critics. After all, Israel refuses “to give up land conquered in war.” Come again? Israel conquered nothing. Israel is the target of would-be conquerors whom it has managed to thwart through five or six (depending on how you count them) aggressive wars waged against the tiny Jewish state since 1948.

In 1948, the Arabs declared an unprovoked war on the Jews who had been given an internationally recognized mini-state on land previously possessed by the Turks for 400 years. That 1948 war – a racist war to expel a non-Arab people from the Middle East (and specifically Jews) – has continued unabated for 60 years. Determined to “push the Jews into the sea,” the Arab aggressors have refused to sign peace agreements in 1949, in 1967, in 1973 and after the first Intifada in 2000. When Israel unilaterally withdrew its troops from Gaza in 2006 absent a peace signed by the Arabs, Gaza became a terrorist state and fired 7000 rocket attacks into Israeli schoolyards and towns for more than a year until Israel struck back. Shame on Andrew for implying that this was not self-defense and for referring to Gaza as “conquered land,” implying that Israel was ever the aggressor. This is not reasonable criticism of Israel Andrew; it is apologetics for war criminals.

David Horowitz was one of the founders of the New Left in the 1960s and an editor of its largest magazine, Ramparts. He is the author, with Peter Collier, of three best selling dynastic biographies: The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty (1976); The Kennedys: An American Dream (1984); and The Fords: An American Epic (1987). Looking back in anger at their days in the New Left, he and Collier wrote Destructive Generation (1989), a chronicle of their second thoughts about the 60s that has been compared to Whittaker Chambers’ Witness and other classic works documenting a break from totalitarianism. Horowitz examined this subject more closely in Radical Son (1996), a memoir tracing his odyssey from “red-diaper baby” to conservative activist that George Gilder described as “the first great autobiography of his generation.” He is author of the newly published book The Great Betrayal (Regnery 2014), which is a chronicle of the Democrats treachery in the war on terror before 9/11 to the death of Osama bin Laden.

Thanks for the updated link at myisrael.org.il. Essentially, that short video shows Arabs in Gaza openly celebrating the 9/11 attacks; and states that “Palestinian” Arabs supported Hitler and Bin Laden. It’s appaling that Youtube (Google) blocked the video, claiming it violates their policy on “shocking and disgusting content.”

Nestor James

Boy, that pro-Israeli stuff gets knocked off of YouTube real quick, doesn't it? Is YouTube owned by The Muslim Brotherhood or something?
I went to the Israeli site. Yes, the "Palestinians" supported Adolph Hitler and Osama bin Laden and yes, the public needs to know that. Good post.

kblink45

The source of western civilization's excellence isn't its humanistic impulse, its excellence is the source of its humanism. Andrew and other well-meaning westerners embrace the Palestinians because that is what great people do, exercise remarkable feats of empathy; it is what makes us proudest. What liberals fail to realize is that the dimensions of the moral sphere are coterminous with the rule of law and private property and, ultimately, with individual responsibility. To extinguish the light of Israel is to return the flames of Prometheus to the vengeful gods.

http://hereticscrusade.blogspot.com Guy DeWhitney

Nicely argued

http://wwwtwosetsofbooks.blogspot.com/ patti

The self-described "intellectual" Sullivan is dancing as fast as he can to try to remain relevant.. Those days have come and gone. As a gay man who would be stoned to death in any country in the Middle East except Israel, he yearns to make us pause and ponder…. how… contrarian! Instead he is exceedingly tiresome. Just like the "Pacifist" Quakers in Chicago's Faith Coalition to Destroy Israel. http://wwwtwosetsofbooks.blogspot.com/2011/05/chi…

Steve

…but isn't this an expression of the self-destructiveness at the heart of homosexuality?

courdeleon

Well done!

rjk

Since Andrew's "marriage" to someone named Aaron, he has turned from a conservative (understandingly over concerned with gay issues) to a leftist nut case (obsessed with Palin and Israel). It is very clear that he needs a hysterectomy!

jbtrevor

Why is it that conservatives & Israel aren't winning the disinformation war, David? If there were one thing ''we'' could do to turn the tide, what would it be?

ziontruth

We need to gain control over the media for that. Currently the media is in Marxist, meaning enemy, hands.

jbtrevor

I'd go for that…let's all pitch in and buy CNN, CBS, NBC, etc

Steve

Correct….the almost complete control of the media by the Progressive/Fascists was long in coming and seems to give the Radical Left a significant , perhaps insurmountable advantage.

Nestor James

That's because only one side is engaged in the "disinformation war". If you look at Israeli propaganda you will see that it is filled with information, not disinformation. The Arabs and the left are what you would call "shameless liars"; it's a devastatingly effective tool and they have both shown their mastery of the art. The thing is, we in the West just aren't expecting that. I mean, it's actually illegal in Congress or Parliament to come out and call somebody a liar, isn't it? Democratic people feel that they are sullying themselves by lying, while Muslims and leftists welcome it as an old friend.

John

That is an excellent question. From what I've seen and heard, the Palestinians have terrific PR, plus students here and in Europe that have a lot of money thus supporting the MB and the Muslim Students Assoc. Israel doesn't come crying to the world and gain the empathy like the Palestinians and Muslims do. They need to. I try to talk to everyone I see about it and dispel as much of the lies as possible. Get everyone you can to ACT for America meetings. They're bringing in Geert Wilders from Holland to Nashville next week. Get into the churches that will listen. Tell them of our Biblical responsibility toward Israel and the Jews. Write things on Facebook. There are many listening. We do need more and more people speaking up.

Rob

Good point, Patti. Ironic that these very same people whom Kushner supports would stone to him to death for being a homosexual.

http://frontpagemag.com myleslman

I agree with the posters saying Sullivan is irrelevant, and frankly should not be taken seriously. Why he still has an audience beyond gay intellectuals is curious.

He says very little, adds nothing, and needs to think before he speaks.

stuart rose

The odd thing about Sullivan's Israel bashing is that as recently as about 2003
Sullivan was passionately pro-Israel, arguing that Israel had every right to attack terror cells on the West Bank and Gaza. He wrote about how Fatah and Hamas operated so as to increase civilian deaths and injuries when Israel counter-attacked.
And then – and I don't know how and why – he began blaming Israel for the diplomatic impasse with the PA, accusing the IDF of brutality, and "discovering" Israel's original sin of dispossessing the Palestinians. Keep in mind that when Andrew Sullivan turned on Israel, he was already a man well into his forties, a political animal, an editor of the New Republic who had heard all of the anti-Israel myths and calumnies, and had never fallen for them. So what happened? Now, he did go from being passionately in favor of the Iraq War to vehemently opposing it; but there he didn't jettison his basic values and command of the facts as much as he turned against a war that principled people could consider to have been a mistake.

http://KorzybskiFiles.blogspot.com Bruce Kodish

Antisemitic boyfriend?

Fred Dawes

The Palestinians have no case, in 1940/41 hitler was making deals with palestinians to murder any jews that got away for Europe.
The reason why Sullivan is doing his thing on the jews is HE IS A TOTAL FOOL.
He wants something from the palestinians what that thing is he only knows.

stuart rose

Fred, you say Sullivan's going after Israel is because he is a total fool- and because he wants something from the Palestinians. I don't know. Of course, it doesn't really matter, but something weird happened. He wasn't Ron Paul or Pat Buchanan or a dozen other public figures who've always had it in for Israel- and beyond Israel, Jews who speak up on Israel's behalf. The guy was so staunchly pro-Israel well into his forties. Strange.

Fred Dawes

Its likely he( Sullivan ) is like our government, just look at all the really big Mosques being built inside the USA Just look at P.C. And soon it will be illegal for anyone not muslim to say anything against islam and to talk out for ISRAEL, We are doomed to become a nothing country and to be obiterated as a people and all our cultural ideals of both right and wrong good and evil will disappear and the death of a jews will be next, God may cry but he will not act to help total fools.

Steve

Aren't they both homosexuals?

zsqpwxxeh

When did the reflexive anti-Israel slant begin among American liberals? It wasn't always this way.

Fred Dawes

when money came in to the banks

ziontruth

When the Marxist branch of the Left took over the older, patriotic, non-treasonous Social-Democrat branch, starting in the 1960s.

Glennd1

Uhh, just so you folks know, the "history" of Israel's victim status in the region is completely false. I'll stick with just one fact for y'all. For 8 or more months before the Arab's attacked in '48, the Israeli's own paramiitary units. some as large at 10,000 men, and some operating as freelance terrorist gangs, uprooted 300,000 Arabs from their homes in Palestine. Just taking this narrow fact into account, changes everything that follows, and to ignore this factual reality is dishonest and misleading for readers who don't know the actual history of the conflict.

Zionist aggression, violence and terrorism were the order of the day in Palestine during the years in which they continuously attacked the British and Arabs to press the Zionist cause. So, please, don't dare give me the Jews as victims line in the formation of Israel – the exact opposite is true. Lol, we are backing one set of religious fanatics over another, much larger and more dangerous group of religious fanatics. It's not in our interest and we should just let these people work it out without us.

Jim

Could I bother you for a reference on what you just posted.
perhaps they were part of the British army just doing WWII stuff.

Raymond in DC

Absolute rubbish. Read Efraim Karsh's "Palestine Betrayed". He's one of the leading historians of that period. The other is Benny Morris, especially his more recent works which utilize more recently available archival material. Both refute your claims.

http://www.libertariancomment.com Glenn Donovan

My claims are based, in part, on the work of Morris. If you don’t know that Ben Gurion knew they had to rid Israel of the Arabs, then you don’t know anything. If you don’t admit that early Zionists talked about this issue, then you don’t know anything. If you don’t know that Morris calls it a “justified” ethnic cleansing, than you don’t know anything. If you don’t know that the Stern Gang, also referred to as the Lehi were committed terrorists, and that the Israelis today give out a medal called the Lehi Medal, than you don’t know anything.

Glennd1

Jim – Thanks for the thoughtful reply. The good news is that you can check any historical source for this information, including the work of many Israeli, Jewish and Zionist historians. Do some web searches and you'll be flooded with correct accounts. If you want to read history, try the work of Benny Morris (a Jewish Israeli), himself a world authority on the subject. But don't bother reading anything by Dershowitz – he's a fraud and a liar. In academic circles he's considered a joke, peddling a history that was debunked 25 yrs ago, but he still peddles it.

A good starting point might be to look up the bombing of the King David hotel in '46 by Zionists, killing over a hundred. Or look up the history of the 'Stern Gang' or Lehi -a terrorist organization which Yitzhak Shami (PM of Israel in '83) headed at one point. There are also the Irgun and Hagana (sp?) who committed atrocities which are well documented, well before the Arab "attack".

The sad truth is that Americans have been sold a bill of lies about Israel's "victim status". Do you know that our own CIA begged Truman not to sign the U.N. resolution forming the Jewish territories, claiming it would result in endless war? Or that the U.S. refused to back the original League of Nations British Mandate for Palestine with force, because we thought the entire idea of creating a Jewish homeland on what had been Arab land for centuries was a stupid idea?

One final note. I have no problem with Jews, in fact, I grew up in a community with a large Jewish population, have had Jewish girlfriends and actually think very highly of the Jewish culture. I supported Israel for a long time, until I started reading the actual history of the region. In particular, when I discovered that the Jews ran 630,000 Arabs off their land and from their homes from '47 to '49, and despite U.N. resolutions in '49 and every year after, commanding the right of return for these 'Palestinians', Israel refused to allow them to return to their homes, I began to realize that there was much more going on than I was being told by the right wing media. It turns out that Israeli leadership all along planned on purging the Arabs/Muslims from their midst once they acquired their territory. Fair enough, it's a territorial squabble – and a religiously based one at that. But don't tell me it's in the U.S. interest to back Israel, it never was and still isn't. It also isn't moral. This is one of the major reasons why we are so hated in the Arab world you know. They can't understand why we won't acknowledge the simple fact that the Israelis committed ethnic cleansing against the Arabs in Palestine.

If you are really brave, go listen to some of the criticisms by folks like David Finkelstein, who's actually banned from Israel. Finkelstein, an American Jew whose parents were holocaust survivors, is an academic who speaks without fear, but with great factual accuracy about the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and is unflinching in his critique of Zionism and Israel. You don't need to agree with him – I don't agree with all his criticism, but his command of the facts and perspective are incredibly eye opening.

Search out the truth – and you will be horrified by our support of Israel, and the reflexive American attitude "the Palestinians are animals" and "Israel is the victim". Nothing could be farther from the truth. If you open your mind even further and give at least a modicum of consideration to Palestinian suffering, you might then ask yourself, what would lead a people to support suicide bombing to achieve their ends? What might cause a culture to become some so desperate, so debased that this seems like a good option to them? I mean, once you acknowledge that the Palestinians are actually human beings and have at least some legitimate complaints, you may see their fight in a different light. And then people will call you an anti-semite too, which is fun, cuz then you get to see how crazed and fanatical Zionists are.

I say, let them fight it out. The more religious fanatics who die on both sides, the better off we'll all be.

ziontruth

"If you want to read history, try the work of Benny Morris…"

Don't forget to read the more recent articles by Morris, in which he says it was all justified, otherwise there would have been a genocide of the Jews in 1947-9.

"I have no problem with Jews, in fact, I grew up in a community with a large Jewish population,…"

And some of your best friends were Jews.

"…have had Jewish girlfriends…"

Poor girls.

"…and actually think very highly of the Jewish culture."

No, you don't. If you did, you'd think highly of that inseparable part of Jewish culture that is Jewish Palestinian nationalism a.k.a. Zionism, the ancient doctrine that every Jew's one and only true homeland is the Land of Israel. You wouldn't be saying something like:

"In particular, when I discovered that the Jews ran 630,000 Arabs off their land…"

Palestine is not any Arab's land. Arabs are indigenous to the Arabian Peninsula and settler-colonist land-thieves everywhere else.

"But don't tell me it's in the U.S. interest to back Israel, it never was and still isn't."

It's especially not in Israel's interest to be backed by the U.S. when U.S. aid can be used as a means of extortion (telling Jews how much and where they can build on their own land) when people like you are in positions of power.

"This is one of the major reasons why we are so hated in the Arab world you know."

You are ignorant Chamberlainian scum. The one and only reason is Islam. You wish to appease Islamic imperialism on the Jewish State's expense.

"…you might then ask yourself, what would lead a people to support suicide bombing to achieve their ends?"

You might ask where are the Haitian or North Korean suicide bombers–people whose standards of living are a millionfold lower than that of the average Arab settler in Palestine.

"What might cause a culture to become some so desperate, so debased that this seems like a good option to them?"

They have none. They are thieves, cheats, liars, murderers, settlers, colonists, invaders, usurpers, death-worshipers, hatemongers and evildoers. And you defend them.

http://www.libertariancomment.com Glenn Donovan

Not even reading past the first argument, which is insipid. According to Morris, the ethnic cleansing was necessary for survival of the Jewish state. Yes, I buy that. But It was the formation of the Jewish state by the West in the first place that caused the violence against them. The Zionists had been campaigning violently for decades in Palestine before the U.N. resolution creating the Jewish territory, as were the Arabs, and they were all in conflict with each other so the mess is far bigger than you allude to, actually.And please don’t give me the Arab Nazi nonsense – it’s a distraction. We know the Islamists and Jihadists are a problem but that only argues for not stirring the pot with them in the first place, making the idea of plunkind down Israel in their midst even more ludicrous.

But Morris’s key point is so absurd, perhaps it escapes your notice? The fact that the Arabs living in Palestine were willing to fight back and were eventually aided by other Arab countries is not a genocidal impulse – it is a survival impulse. To fight back when your homes are being stolen by the hundreds of thousands is not genocide, you willfully blind sophist.

Glennd1

I don't defend them. I just see the Zionist fanatics as morally evil as well. Or is that too complicated a thought for you? I don't support Hamas, or even much of what comes out of the PA, Fatah or PLO – and now that they are united again, I think we should obey the laws on our books and cut funding to them immediately and wash our hands of the entire mess. But I also think we should cut all funding to Israel and make clear that don't make any security guarantees for her. Maybe we could offer Jews special refugee status, although that is troublesome because there are hundreds of millions of political refugees in the world, in fear for their lives who would like to come to the U.S. and the Jews have no special claim to jump that line. I say let them fight it out or leave. I care not whether every religious fanatic there – Jewish or Muslim is killed in the process, it is not our affair, just as many wars and territorial disputes around the world are not our business. If private people want to help, great, have at it. but no support from our nation is justified on the grounds of strategic interest or ideals. Quite the opposite, in fact.

And if you don't understand how much our support of Israel has cost our standing in the world, you simply are ignorant of the world. f

ziontruth

"I don't support Hamas, or even much of what comes out of the PA, Fatah or PLO…"

You always list Zionism's "crimes." You never list the crimes of Hamas, Fatah or PLO. One can hardly be chastised for thinking you're biased to their side.

"But I also think we should cut all funding to Israel and make clear that don't make any security guarantees for her."

It's every nation's right to do as it wishes with its own money. Note, however, that cutting off Israel also means we become free to build on our own land (both pre- and post-1967) without limit, and to expel the Arab settlers from our land without deferring to any other nation's opinion.

"Maybe we could offer Jews special refugee status,…"

Most of us aren't planning on leaving. We stay here to live or die. It's our one and only homeland.

"And if you don't understand how much our support of Israel has cost our standing in the world, you simply are ignorant of the world."

You're the ignorant one, as you fail to acknowledge the many states in the world threatened by the same Islamic threat as are Israel and the U.S. despite never having given any kind of support to Israel. Sweden and Spain have never given Israel aid; the Muslims wreak their usual havoc there regardless. As I said, to consider Israel as the cause of Islamic aggression is pure Chamberlainism; it is as irrational and immoral as it was to seek to appease Nazism on Czechoslovakia's expense.

Glennd1

Your style is so tedious, it's like a Daily Kos post, parsing words and twisting them while ignoring the larger picture. But don't play the Jewish victim card anymore, okay? The Jews got themselves into this mess over there and you can get out of it on your own. Finally, I of course know the threat from Islam, bu this article wasn't about that, and the author made factually inaccurate statements about the '48 war, which is what I was correcting. Fyi, you show what a rabid maniac you are every time you post. Go on, take all the land from "the river to the sea" which I know is what you want anyway, right? You don't really care about international law, human rights or any of the suffering of the Palestinians brought on by Zionist actions – at least lets be clear about that.

ziontruth

"…it's like a Daily Kos post…"

Considering you're the one spouting so many of the points made by the DailyKKKos crowd regarding Israel, that's quite a sample of chutzpah there.

"But don't play the Jewish victim card anymore, okay?"

I never did. My argument for Zionism has always been based on us Jews being the indigenous Palestinians, and not on the need for redress of past wrongs such as the Holocaust. It's the Arab settlers (falsely-called "Palestinians") who harp on constantly on the victim card, if you haven't noticed.

"…take all the land from 'the river to the sea' which I know is what you want anyway, right?"

Yeah. Funny thing, isn't it? I mean, next thing you'll have the Greeks saying the Peloponessus (sp?) Peninsula (the one with Sparta at its center) is theirs. Just what is the world coming to?!

"You don't really care about international law,…"

No, I don't, and I'm proud of that. International "law" is a suicide pact that gives any nation (or non-state actor) that ignores it the military edge over any nation that does. International "law" is right now being used to criticize the U.S.A. over the killing of Osama, while not having a peep to say about the 3000 whose murder he had directed.

"…human rights…"

Spare me the talk of human rights for a culture of raising children to aspire to be suicide-murderers.

"…or any of the suffering of the Palestinians"

The Jews are the only true Palestinians; Arab settlers are not, cannot be Palestinians, as they are Arabs.

"…at least lets be clear about that."

At least let's be clear you're far from being a "Cut off all aid and let them duke it out" isolationist; you, like many of those faux-isolationists of the day like Ron Paul and Pat Buchanan, are wolves in sheep's clothing, playing isolationist but truly holding the exact same interventionist, anti-Zionist, pro-Arab-settler statements as the Left holds. You're phonies, all of you. You are anti-Zionist scum.

Glennd1

There you go again with that Daily Kos style. Fyi, you can't have it both ways – either I'm a crazy leftie or an anti-semitic libertarian, lol.You demonstrate your own bigotry with your comments – and then accuse me of somehow cryptically supporting the Palestinians against Israel. You read my posts, yes? I advocate that supporting Israel isn't in our interests, nor is it moral position for us to take given the depredations visited upon the Arabs living in Jewish Palestinian territory form '47-'49. They were unhumane acts of vile religious supremacy, much like those of the Islamists you so despise, who I despise as well, fyi. I se little difference between your ilk and Jihadists, but I'm sure you can't see how crazed you are.

As for me being "anti-Zionist" – hell yeah. How can anyone who knows anything about the corrupt, craven, violent and bigoted history of the Zionism support it? Only some Jews like you do (many Jews and Israelis don't) – and just as you say so plainly above, you want "your" land back, no matter what the cost to people who lived there. Fine – you advocate for the assertion of your claims above other's rights. Have at it, but there is no reason for Americans to support it.

ziontruth

"…you can't have it both ways – either I'm a crazy leftie or an anti-semitic libertarian,…"

I don't care either way. Anti-Zionism is anti-Zionism, no matter its source.

"You demonstrate your own bigotry with your comments…"

If I'm a bigot then every nationalist is a bigot.

"…and then accuse me of somehow cryptically supporting the [Arab settlers] against Israel."

What else can I conclude from the fact that you take the time to list the "crimes" of Zionism but refer to the Muslims' crimes in a summary fashion, if at all? I know bias when I see it.

"How can anyone who knows anything about the corrupt, craven, violent and bigoted history of the Zionism support it?"

How can anyone call Zionism corrupt, craven and bigoted except if he has been duped by the Arab Settler Narrative that posits a fake, fraudulent "non-Jewish indigenous Palestinian nation"? You've been had. I can't do a thing for you, but at least shut up about it. If you claim to be an isolationist then don't go taking one of the sides.

"Only some Jews like you do…"

Most Jews in Israel do. American Jewry with its 78% vote for Hussein isn't representative of Israeli Jewish thinking.

"…you want your land back, no matter what the cost to people who lived there."

Yes, just as the Arab settlers want "their" land back, no matter what the cost to people who lived there. Kindly tell me why an "isolationist" supports or even just believes one claim over the other. As an isolationist you're a fraud.

"Have at it, but there is no reason for Americans to support it."

If you really believed this, and this alone, you would have written only this and not the rest of what you wrote.

Jim_C

Glennd1, I've always thought that most nation-foundings are rather messy and ugly, and that includes our own, particularly with regard to the indigenous population. Israel's misfortune is that theirs, essentially, occurred in our modern era.

I don't doubt the essence of what you're saying (have no idea about the numbers), but even so, I don't think it justifies the psychopathology of that region's hatred and scapegoating of Israel.

Glennd1

Again, thanks for engaging thoughtfully. It is particularly hard to parse this all down morally because of a number of factors, including the way that Islamic supremacism motivates in part the resistance to Israel. But if you just subtract that from the moral equation, it doesn't affect the basic calculus that determines that the Israelis injured the Arabs living in Palestine severely.

As for the messiness of nations forming, of course you are correct. However, in the 20th century we were trying to create an international order that rose above such barbarism, and there was no greater symbol of that desire than the formation of the U.N., which espoused principals of non-violence and human rights. And then in one of its first acts, it issued the U.N. resolution creating the Jewish territory, ignoring the will of all nations in the region, and instead acting as an imperial tool of the West. Just imagine, for a moment, you are an Arab Muslim living in Palestine and one day, the U.N. says you now live in Israel, a Jewish state, and then a Jewish army comes along and runs you off your land. How much moral respect would you give the institutions and the West as a whole when it behaves in such a crass way and won't even take responsibility for the harm it creates, all while preaching its moral superiority?

Moreover, my entire point isn't to bash the Israelis, but rather that it is in no way in the U.S.'s interests to back Israel. Never has, and never will be. When you listen to Arabs, this is their first complaint about us, and it has cost us dearly in treasure and blood in the region, and why? So some Jews can feel good about living on land that their holy book says was theirs s few thousand years ago? The Muslims have the same claim and were already living there for centuries. And don't give me the Jewish "safety" song and dance. There were many countries which were open to Jewish refugees after the war. And this campaign for a Jewish homeland on the God-given land of Palestine began at the end of the 19th century, long before the holocaust. Don't forget that the Jews call themselves the "Chosen People" and believe that the territory from "the river to the sea" is their God-given right. We call that religious fanaticism when Muslims do it – why don't we call it the same when Jews do so? And why would we make common cause with such fanatics?

ziontruth

"Moreover, my entire point isn't to bash the Israelis,…"

You spout just about every one of the lies the Leftists are wont to spout on Israel (foremostly the view of the Jewish State as a Western colonialist project), but no, no bashing of Israel is intended, no sir.

"We call that religious fanaticism when Muslims do it – why don't we call it the same when Jews do so?"

Because, even if you disagree with the Jewish claim, it is far, far less a concern of yours thanthe Islamic claim. The Jewish claim is of Palestine only; the Muslims claim the ENTIRE WORLD to be their entitlement. Jews don't want to add your land, or any land outside Palestine for that matter, to their territory; Muslims, on the other hand, think it's their duty to force you to live under Islamic law.

You don't have to support Israel; but if you really wish to be neutral and isolationist, you must not support Israel's enemies either.

truthbe known

glennd1
you are an excellent propagandist for the leftist/palestinian side. one of these days, it would be a good thing if you read some real history books instead of just the daily kos or al jazeera. your historical knowledge is wanting and your writings are very seldom intersecting with the truth. i love the way you state "you are not bashing Israel" , no indeed, just like the way the Jihadists claim they represent the religion of peace as they are cutting off Daniel Pearl's head, or blowing up our troops with ied's. Hamas should hire you asap.

Robert

Horowitz accuses Kushner of being unbalanced–which is true enough, even if his epithets are unfair. He should look in the mirror though: “Israel conquered nothing.” However one wishes to characterize what happened in 1967, Israel took over a lot more land than it had previously, and remains in the Occupied Territories of Gaza, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights in disregard of two UN Resolutions. That much is objective fact. To claim that “Israel conquered nothing” is less than half the truth–it’s disinformation.